March 19 Photoperiods
The new update is up!
Here's the link to the sunrise/sunset data, and here's the link to this week's clues.
Have you figured out the countries yet? Kate and I spent all morning on it!
The new update is up!
Here's the link to the sunrise/sunset data, and here's the link to this week's clues.
Have you figured out the countries yet? Kate and I spent all morning on it!
Kate and Emily had a great time working on figuring out the latitude of their respective mystery classes yesterday. We used a trial and error approach, looking up the photoperiods of cities at their classes' longitude to compare to the photoperiod of their mystery classes. We've got pretty solid guesses as to the cities, now. Fun!
So my question for you ladies is: Do you want to start sharing city & country guesses here, in the comments? Or will that spoil the guessing fun for anyone? I suppose if we're doing it in the comments, people who want to compare guesses can click on comments, and people who don't can avoid them. What do you think?
Tips for first-timers: we've now reached what I think is the most fun part of the project. Your photoperiod graphs will help you figure out the latitude of your Mystery Class. As I said, a lot of trial and error goes into the guesswork at this part of the stage.
For example, we knew from the comments that Class #4 is at about the same latitude as the folks in Denver. Emily Sanchez's class, #8, is on a line slightly below Class #4's on the graph. I asked the girls questions to help them figure out the significance of the lines on the graph.
Q. Is Class #8 in the northern hemisphere or the southern hemisphere?
A. Its photoperiod increases as the equinox approaches, so it must be in the northern hemisphere.
Q. Class #8's line is below Class #4's line on the graph—does that mean it is north or south of Class #4?
A. North, because the farther from the middle of the graph (the 12-hour line) it is, the farther the class is from the equator.
And so forth.
Next, we looked up Denver's latitude (because we remembered that the Denver folks said they are at about the same latitude as their Mystery Class). There are lots of places to find city latitudes on the internet, including the photoperiod calculators in the sidebar. (This site is particularly good.) Another easy way is simply to Google the words "Denver latitude." (But don't use the quotation marks.)
Denver's latitude is about 39 degrees N. Since we already knew the longitude for Class #8, we looked at cities on that longitude, a little north of 39 degrees latitude. Then we started Googling for the latitude of those cities.
Now came the trial and error part. We used the photoperiod calculator to find the photoperiod for some of those cities, on the same dates as the dates on our graph. Gradually we narrowed down the area until we had a good, solid guess about Class #8's latitude. More Google fun, some map inspection, and we think we found the place! This week's cultural clue matches our guess. We can't wait for next week's clue!
After that, we did the same thing for Class #10. Finding a starting point was easy, because our graph tells us Class 10 must be in the southern hemisphere, and at the right longitude, there are only two countries to choose from. The culture clue told us which one to try first!
We had a great afternoon doing our guesswork. Kate and I are going to make guesses about some of the other cities this morning. Fun fun!
Today's update includes the first set of cultural clues!
MYSTERY
CLASS |
SUNRISE | SUNSET |
| #1 | 07:31 |
19:11 |
| #2 | 06:42 |
18:36 |
| #3 | 03:48 |
18:01 |
| #4 | 06:32 |
18:17 |
| #5 | 05:48 |
18:02 |
| #6 | 06:16 |
18:15 |
| #7 | 06:07 |
18:25 |
| #8 | 06:40 |
18:25 |
| #9 | 06:20 |
18:27 |
| #10 | 07:22 |
19:50 |
I will update this as your answers come in...that way the longitudes are all in one place!
Erica's Emily and my Kate had such a good time today working out their longitude clues. Isn't it exciting to be able to narrow things down? We taped strings onto our wall map to show our classes' longitudes (Erica is class #8 and we are class #10).
LONGITUDE
Class #1 122.75 degrees W
Class #2
Class #3 26.75W
Class #4 116.5E
Class #5 33.75E
Class #6
Class #7
Class #8 9 degrees E
Class #9 78.5 deg W
Class #10 135.75E
(Renaming this post so it has the date in it!) :)
Posting this week's update here, but if you'd rather take it back to the boards, that's fine by me! Big week this week: the longitude clues are here!
MYSTERY
CLASS |
SUNRISE | SUNSET |
| #1 | 06:45 |
18:00 |
| #2 | 06:50 |
18:32 |
| #3 | 03:03 |
18:48 |
| #4 | 06:43 |
18:10 |
| #5 | 05:47 |
18:06 |
| #6 | 06:21 |
18:13 |
| #7 | 06:04 |
18:32 |
| #8 | 06:51 |
18:17 |
| #9 | 06:22 |
18:29 |
| #10 | 07:16 |
19:59 |
Here's the link to this week's update. Sorry I didn't get this up sooner—my poor hubby threw his back out and it's chaos around here!
The vernal equinox is March 21...which means our longitude clues are just around the corner!
Oh, and one more thing—with the boards reopening next week, how do y'all want to proceed? Do you want to keep posting here, or on the boards? Either way is fine with me—I have no preference at all. :)
MYSTERY
CLASS |
SUNRISE | SUNSET |
| #1 | 06:59 |
17:49 |
| #2 | 06:56 |
18:28 |
| #3 | 02:13
|
19:41
|
| #4 | 06:53 |
18:02 |
| #5 | 05:46 |
18:10 |
| #6 | 06:26 |
18:11 |
| #7 | 06:00** |
18:38** |
| #8 | 07:02 |
18:09 |
| #9 | 06:23 |
18:30 |
| #10 | 07:10 |
20:08 |
Here's the link to this week's Update!
I'll paste in the sunrise/sunset data, but of course there's a lot more good stuff at the link!
MYSTERY
CLASS |
SUNRISE | SUNSET |
| #1 | 07:13 |
17:37 |
| #2 | 07:02 |
18:24 |
| #3 | 01:09
|
20:43
|
| #4 | 07:03 |
17:54 |
| #5 | 05:44 |
18:14 |
| #6 | 06:30 |
18:09 |
| #7 | 06:57 |
19:44 |
| #8 | 07:12 |
18:01 |
| #9 | 06:24 |
18:31 |
| #10 | 07:04 |
20:17 |
Starting the new thread for tomorrow's data! Please post your times in the comments. Thanks!
Updated to add the link to this week's Mystery Class Update, which asks:
Is it possible for sunrise to occur after sunset on the same day at the same place?
Take a look at the mysterious (but correct) sunrise/sunset times for Mystery Class #3. What in the world is going on there? Think it through, write your thoughts in a journal, and then come together to discuss in groups.
What are you able to learn about this location from its unique times? Do you think next week's data from this site will be unusual again?
Class #1: 9 hrs 38 min
Class #2: 11 hrs 2 min
Class #3: 24 hrs
Class #4: 10 hrs 17 min
Class #5: 12 hrs 40 min
Class #6: 11 hrs 27 min
Class #7: 13 hrs 5 min
Class #8: 10 hrs 13 min
Class #9: 12 hrs 8 min
Class #10: 13 hrs 41 min
Welcome, 4Realers! Here is our temporary home during the forum's Lenten hiatus. Today I'm just testing out the link.
We can put links in the sidebar and make it a useful resource, yes?
And someone think of a good name for our group! I'll change the blog title accordingly. But the URL will stay the same: http://melissawiley.typepad.com/mysteryclass.
(Sorry about my name in the URL—it was easiest for me just to set this up on my Typepad account.)
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